New Faith, New Tradition
PNG is one of the countries with the highest Christian population in the world. More than 96 percent of the population is Christian and the majority are Protestant.
Residents of Tais, Papua New Guinea praying. The majority of the residents of this area are Protestant Christians.
In the memories of Singai Suku, 60, the head of Tais village, the change of faith in his village began in 1969. At that time, an Australian missionary came to this small village in the interior of Western Province, Papua New Guinea (PNG).
Grahame Martin, the missionary, was a thin man and a World War II veteran. Since the 1950s he had traveled to the most remote hinterlands of PNG to preach his religion. All the residents of Tais village at that time trembled when they met him for the first time. Residents thought the white man was the spirit of their ancestors or at least, an ancestral messenger. That belief made them very afraid and at the same time respectful and obedient to him.